Bullz-Eye Blog » Opie Winstonhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com
men's lifestyle blog, blog for guysTue, 31 Mar 2015 12:44:56 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1Sons of Anarchy 5.13: J’ai Obtenu Cettehttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/12/05/sons-of-anarchy-5-13-jai-obtenu-cette/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/12/05/sons-of-anarchy-5-13-jai-obtenu-cette/#commentsWed, 05 Dec 2012 23:20:43 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=21694SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects of the show up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

Two weeks ago, I said, “Violence and adrenaline are as big a draw for [the Sons] as the brotherhood, motorcycles, and ‘easy’ money. You don’t live this kind of life, or at least continue to, without a taste for cheap thrills.” Back then I was referring to Jax, Tig, Chibs, and Happy escaping an ambush by going off-roading in a station wagon as bullets flied in every direction. After confirming that they were all alive, the guys laughed and screamed with excitement. Happy spoke for the group when he exclaimed “I am rapturous!”

That was a long winded way of saying these guys are adrenaline junkies. They are addicted to the lives of danger, risk, and crime they lead. Turn to Clay’s actions at the beginning of this season for further proof. Upon realizing that “the life” might be taken away from him, he did everything in his power to prevent it—like a caged lion claws and scratches in an attempt to find freedom or, say, Bob Hughes hustles to get a fix. Ironically enough, the SAMCRO clubhouse has a “No Junkies” sign, right by the doorway leading out to the picnic tables.

Regardless of what substance, lifestyle, or what have you an addict is dependent on, if he truly wants to quit, he quits. Right there on the spot. If he really means it, there is no last hurrah, no one last fix or drink, he won’t give himself another month of using, he won’t say Christmas day will be his last. Because when an addict gives himself that time, it’s not just time to use, but to reconsider whether he really wants to quit, and, more often than not, rationalize why it’s just not the right time yet.

You may see where I’m going with this. Jax and Tara were never going to get out and live safe, peaceful lives with their boys. They sentenced themselves to life in Charming the second they started making excuses and delaying. Jax was being just as dishonest (with everyone, including himself) when he said he’d get out once he’d “protected the club” as a junkie who promises to quit if he can use for just one more month, day, or hour. It’s always “just one more.” Likewise, if the Teller family really wanted to get out of Charming, they would have done so, right the fuck then, the same way an addict or alcoholic who’s quitting needs to really and truly commit right there on the spot. Otherwise, by the time you actually mean it, it’ll be too late. And for Jax and Tara, boy is it too late.

The episode title, “J’ai Obtenu Cette,” means “I got this” in French (perhaps as a nod to Chucky’s new language of choice). It’s a phrase Jax could have spoken in reference to just about every task he set out to accomplish this season. He now has everything he ever wanted, but it doesn’t feel right. There’s a reason for that (aside from his wife getting arrested): as we’ve discussed so often, he had to transform into Clay to get it. The scary thing, both for us as fans of the idealistic Jax of the past and the people around him, is that he’s way better at being Clay than Clay ever was. Because while his willingness to do anything is reminiscent of Clay, his intelligence and ability to ensure his own hands appear clean is more in the vein of one Damon Pope. When Marks, Pope’s now-elevated number two, implies that the reason the chips fell where they did was because Jax engineered it, Jax responds, “You think I planned this whole thing? Come on, man, you’re giving me way too much credit. I ain’t Pope. I’m just a mechanic looking out for my family.” Yeah, whatever.

Last week, I said that if Jax took Pope’s advice about getting revenge indirectly, going behind the club’s back despite a vote to let Clay be, purely for his own purposes, it would be a trademark Clay move. Pope said Jax needed to “step back from the need to feel it” because “it’s not about the process, it’s about the result.” Well he did all that and more, and it cements his transformation into a hybrid monstrosity. Half Clay and half Pope might as well be equal parts Godzilla and King Kong for all the destruction it’s going to cause. The incredible thing about Jax’s plan is that he’s likely to get exactly what he wants, but guaranteed to get at least some satisfaction. The best case scenario (for Jax) is one of Marks’s guys will off Clay before he’s behind bars. The worst case scenario is they don’t, and Clay will still be behind bars.

Bobby knows what Jax did and calls him out on it. Jax suavely brushes off all guilt on a technicality, he didn’t lay a hand on Clay. Bobby responds to the quip, and Jax’s attitude, by saying, “It wasn’t about being smart enough to hurt him, it was about being smart enough not to hurt him. You had a chance to be different.” Jax’s response is “Maybe I’m not so different.” I’ll say. Jax has forgotten why he wanted to be president in the first place. It wasn’t so he could get revenge on Clay and do what he pleased without consequence. It was so he could fulfill he and his father’s lofty ambitions for both himself and the club, it was for his sons (small “s”). Jax is the perfect leader for Clay’s Sons of Anarchy, but he wanted to be that leader for his father’s. As a result, part of the ending montage was Bobby slicing off his VP patch. But he won’t be leaving the club. Given that this is a show about transformations, and more often than not, transformations from one character into another, my prediction is that Bobby will be for Jax what Piney was for Clay. That is, the (relatively) old member, an artifact of another time, powerless to stop Jax’s treachery but still constantly yammering in his ear about it.

So Jax got what he wanted, but contrary to what Pope said, the realities of the process make you wonder whether the result was worth it. That’s just how things go in this show. For example, Roosevelt got some measure of vengeance on the man whose plotting led to his wife’s death. The sheriff didn’t have any proof that Clay was responsible for the break-ins, even though Eli knew he was responsible. Contrarily, he knew Clay wasn’t responsible for Pope’s murder, but that’s the crime he had evidence for.

The best example (outside of Jax), however, is Gemma. Despite everything that Clay’s done to her, and done in general, the cold manner in which his arrest went down made it feel somehow wrong. That’s partly because Clay has been getting slightly sympathetic of late, but more because his downfall was sealed by his wife and Juice, the two people he trusted most. But back to Gemma. She finally gets Nero, but at this point neither of them is the one the other fell in love with. Nero used to be an actual junkie, but as an OG he was addicted to the same lifestyle as Jax and company. The Nero Gemma’s getting has relapsed, he’s back to being a gangster. And Jax poked him with the metaphorical needle, just like he poked Wendy with a real one—completely out of self-interest.

Last of all, there’s Tara. I was really blown away by her arrest, it’s just a road I never saw the show taking. It’s possible that Toric got angry when Otto, you know, bit off his own tongue and tried to get some satisfaction another way, evidence be damned. But the evidence strongly suggests that Gemma is behind it (although Clay’s arrest is proof that in Charming, evidence doesn’t mean shit), and I’m not just talking about the fact that she threatened to dime. Tara’s talk about leaving likely made Gemma panic, then overhearing Jax and Nero talking about getting out was the last straw. Plus, she has a history of lying to law enforcement to get to her grandchildren in this very episode. Showing up to comfort Jax right at the moment of his wife’s arrest is a bold move, like an arsonist returning to watch the fire she started. And, of course, they ended with another play on “the shot,” where the resident old lady puts her arm around the president. Gemma and JT turned into Tara and Jax turned into Gemma and Jax.

A few more things:

-Now that I know Joel McHale won’t be coming back, his appearance sort of seems like a waste. It could be argued that it (potentially) distracted from the show (“Oooo, that’s Joel Mchale, wait what were they saying?”) more than his acting talents added over the average guy they’d get from an audition

-Stuff like Tig and the dog reminds us why we love these guys, who’d be villains in literally any other show.

-Can Juice stay loyal to a plan for either side just once? Right before Roosevelt shows up at Clay’s place, Juice tells him to take his bike and run. He’s lucky that didn’t happen, as it would’ve meant a best case scenario of Jax bringing his snitching to the table and a worst case of Jax having him killed.

-It doesn’t seem like Jax forcing Wendy to get high has messed with her recovery (so far), which is lucky considering how painfully obvious it is that a sober Wendy is the best parent Abel and Thomas can possibly hope to have. Although just because we haven’t seen her using doesn’t mean she isn’t. Even if she’s still clean, if that shot was going to bring her back to her old ways, it wouldn’t necessarily be instantly. Just having that experience in the back of her mind could be a trigger and bring on another relapse in time, this one voluntary.

-I can’t not gloat about calling the way things would go down with Tig/Pope.

-Sometimes, Chekhov’s gun refers to an actual gun.

That’s it for the fifth season. “Sons of Anarchy” will be back to make both its audience and characters miserable next year. To make the time go faster we’ll have “Justified,” the next show I’ll be analyzing, premiering on 1/8/13. Be sure to check back then and don’t forget to follow me on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/12/05/sons-of-anarchy-5-13-jai-obtenu-cette/feed/2Sons of Anarchy 5.12: Darthyhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/29/sons-of-anarchy-5-12-darthy/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/29/sons-of-anarchy-5-12-darthy/#commentsThu, 29 Nov 2012 23:06:37 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=21530SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects of the show up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

Can “Sons of Anarchy” accomplish the unthinkable, can it make Clay Morrow a likable character again? Over the course of the second half of this season, Clay has become more and more sympathetic. He’s not actually sympathetic, not yet anyway, but the Clay of late is at least a human being. His confession to the club was real, the most honest words we’ve ever heard him utter. That’s not to say they were the complete truth or that they didn’t contain some element of self-preservation. And granted, if Bobby got even a whiff of bullshit, I’m sure he would’ve joined the rest of the club in voting “yay” on Clay meeting Mr. Mayhem. But the confession was still a revelation. When we saw Clay ask for some time alone so he could break down and cry, it may have been our first ever glimpse at the person behind the crimes. I had to remind myself of the crimes to stop from feeling sorry for the person.

Clay now hopes to start and lead his own small club to earn money. It’s a dream that has clear parallels with Nero’s hopes of settling down with his son on his uncle’s ranch, completely free of the life he left behind, or Jax’s desire to mold the club to fit his father’s vision (as well as last season’s goal of escaping Charming with Tara and the boys). These are exactly the type of fantasies we expect from the manchildren that populate this show, ambitions that are almost adorable in their simplicity and improbability—like when a toddler tells you he’ll grow up to be a professional baseball player. But just like the characters, we want to believe.

Clay’s retribution is something we’ve yearned for since season four at the latest (the pilot at the earliest), and it was accomplished in a way that met and subverted our expectations at the same time. Clay was brought to the table during the influx of his humanity, and as a result, the verdict on his survival brought both relief and frustration. Part of me enjoyed every moment of the beating Jax handed out afterwards, because I wanted Clay to die too. But at the same time it was the perfect illustration of Jax’s spiral out of control—the way anger and a thirst for revenge are driving him more than the good of the club ever did. It seems Clay’s justification for his dealings with the Nomads made sense in a fucked up, Clay sort of way. He was right that Jax wasn’t ready for the pressures of leadership, just not in the way he expected. Jax has been a fantastic president for the SAMCRO Clay built. But that wasn’t what he wanted when he took the gavel, he wanted to be a great leader for the club as he and his father envisioned it. The protester outside the White House clamors for world peace, but would he have the strength to make it a reality it if he was the one sitting in the oval office?

Love-hate-love (and vice-versa) arcs have always been “Sons of Anarchy’s” bread and butter. In the case of almost every major character, the show has started us out feeling one way and then worked to push us in the other direction. Often, when a character reaches the other side of the spectrum, the show turns him or her right back again. If you, like me, are starting to lose respect for the man Jax has become, it’s a mark of the show’s success. Shooting Wendy with heroin, given that she is an addict in recovery, was truly reprehensible. It’d be easier for us to see Wendy has a point about being the best person to raise the boys if not for the fact that Jax (and to a lesser extent Tara) are the protagonists. Likewise, Pope advises Jax to find a way to have Clay offed indirectly. Maybe it’s what Clay deserves. But at the same time, Jax going behind the club’s back to off him despite the vote to let him walk, purely for his own purposes, would be a trademark Clay move. If that’s the road Jax goes down, it will be the ultimate symbol of his transformation. Actions like these will give his inevitable redemption all the more emotional impact. I’m certain that by the series finale, we’ll be back in Jax’s corner. But I wouldn’t hold my breath. It might take the entirety of the final two seasons to accomplish.

Speaking of Pope, with Clay now stripped of all power, he’s sure to be a major source of conflict moving forward. I still don’t know if I believe Jax is just going to hand Tig over, even if Clay’s ousting means Tig’s usefulness is diminished (or even gone). At the same time I think the new Jax genuinely looks up to Pope. He tells Bobby that “you can’t sit in this chair without being a savage,” and given that Pope is the ultimate mentor in savagery, it makes sense that Jax would continue to seek his counsel. Whether he’s planning to turn Tig over or go to war with Pope, Jax is going to need every play in the savage book. Jax’s decision on the Tig front will either cement Pope as a friend or an enemy during the finale (if it’s the latter, Jax will have a plan to make it seem like he’s giving Tig up until the very last moment before taking Pope out).

Another source of conflict will be Lee Toric, the retired U.S. Marshall played by Donal Logue whose sister was the nurse Tara accidentally helped Otto murder. I predicted this meta motivation last week based on the fact that the actress who played said nurse was Logue’s real-life sister. Tara played her deposition almost perfectly. It’s clear her interrogator had his doubts about her innocence and naivety, but it’s not hard to imagine a scenario in which she gets off and Toric is forced to seek his own justice. Toric is next season’s big bad, meaning he’s here to stay. His appearance during the ending montage showed him holed up in the dark with enough weapons for a small army and a bag full of pill bottles (perhaps he’s addicted to painkillers or some other pharmaceutical, which would give him a weakness and explain why he’s a retired U.S. Marshall). The most unsettling thing, however, may have been Toric’s choice of literature, “Watchfiends and Rack Screams,” by Antonin Artaud. The book was written during the last three years of Artaud’s life, which he spent incarcerated at a mental asylum, and it reads like it. I made that joke about Jax needing every play in the savage book, well, he might have to ask if he can borrow it from Toric first.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/29/sons-of-anarchy-5-12-darthy/feed/0Sons of Anarchy 5.11: To Thine Own Selfhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/21/sons-of-anarchy-5-11-to-thine-own-self/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/21/sons-of-anarchy-5-11-to-thine-own-self/#commentsThu, 22 Nov 2012 00:19:07 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=21343SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects of the show up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

“To Thine Own Self” opened with Tara telling Jax about the offer she got from the practice in Providence. She followed the news up by insisting Jax had accomplished what he set out to and that it’s time to get out of Dodge. “I know why you couldn’t walk away a few months ago. The club’s been your whole life, you couldn’t let it die… But ending RICO saves SAMCRO, and whatever happens with Clay you have put the MC on the right track, you’ve done everything you’ve wanted to do. It’s your turn now, we can move on.” On the surface, she’s right. Especially considering all the shrewd (and more importantly, successful) moves Jax made as the episode moved forward. And yet, we all know there’s a zero percent chance the Teller family will be taking their talents to Providence. And it’s not just because a show called “Sons of Anarchy” would be a lot less interesting absent, you know, the Sons of Anarchy.

Exhibit A is Jax, Tig, Chibs, and Happy’s escape from the members of Nero’s old crew who decided that while they’d like a cache of the club’s guns, they’d prefer not to pay for them. The guys went off-roading in a station wagon, fired some automatic weapons, and narrowly escaped with their lives. Happy even had a bullet graze his head, and his response? “I am rapturous!” He was speaking for the group.

Violence and adrenaline are as big a draw for these guys as the brotherhood, motorcycles, and “easy” money. You don’t live this kind of life, or at least continue to, without a taste for cheap thrills. It doesn’t matter that the club no longer has RICO hanging over his head. It doesn’t matter that both Galindo and the Chinese are on board for the new weapons deal. It wouldn’t even matter if Clay finally got his comeuppance. There are only two places Jax can end up post-SAMCRO: in a cage or in a box. Sorry Tara, your husband is never going to be a peaceful mechanic in motherfucking Rhode Island.

It’s become clear that Jax’s little rage trip is not a temporary result of Opie’s death. This is something that’s been building. A big part of it stems from his ongoing quest to kill Clay, which as Bobby points out is turning Jax into the very thing he despises. But one of this season’s major points is that the gavel is what’s changing our protagonist—that angry and vengeful are necessary characteristics of the man at the head of the table, the man with all the power, the man in control. Maybe Clay became the man we all love to hate because he was under the same pressures Jax is now.

As Jax turns into Clay, Clay turns into something else. These last few episodes, in his talks with Juice and Tig and Jax, those words were genuine and heartfelt. Don’t get me wrong, Clay’s still a snake, as evidenced by the way he slithered those legal documents away just as they (sort of) fell into his former stepson’s hands, but he’s not the same snake. He had the opportunity to eliminate Jax and return to the presidency, instead he gave advice which he believed both good and necessary, that the club shouldn’t just walk away from Galindo. Clay’s not going to give in, let the truth come out, and die in disgrace, but he no longer seems to be motivated purely by self interest. Bobby’s decision to go to Clay at the end of the episode was driven by fear of the new Jax, sure, but it seemed to come from recognition of the new Clay as well.

The new direction of Clay’s character is something I did not see coming. The same can be said of Nero Padilla. When Nero was first introduced, he seemed too good to be true—loyal to Jax, loving to Gemma, a smart and safe business partner—I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. I thought the show would wring drama and suspense out of Nero by having him turn on the club, in some way becoming yet another enemy. Instead, Nero was everything he seemed to be and more. And just look at how that’s worked out for him.

I mentioned that Jax’s arc has demonstrated the way being in charge changes people. Likewise, Nero’s arc is meant to show that just being close to the boss brings tumult and turmoil, anger and vengeance, by proxy. His life’s gone to shit not because he’s an enemy of SAMCRO, but because he’s a friend. When Nero believes his former crew kidnapped Jax, he goes out and does a bit of murder, returning to the life of violent crime he’d sworn was behind him. All because the club was quick to call him when they (thought they) needed his help, and sort of forgot to let him know when they didn’t. The Nero we saw at the end of the episode seemed like he’d just stepped out of a warzone, like he’d been truly traumatized, and he has. He’s messed up, but he’s a former OG, it’s something he’ll get over—or would, if he had Gemma there to comfort him. But he doesn’t. And why’s that again? Because Jax has put his mom to work, throwing both her and Nero under the bus in his efforts to eliminate Clay.

Meanwhile, this episode introduced a new character, Lee Toric, played by Donal Logue, whose sole mission is to make the last few months of Otto’s life a little more miserable, if that’s even possible. We know very little about the character so far, other than that he’s got the pull to get into a maximum security prison and beat the shit out of a dude in solitary confinement. His motivations remain unknown. All we have to go on is his desire to torture Otto and his following Tara at the end of the episode. A good guess would be that his actions have something to do with that nurse Otto murdered. Maybe she was a family member and he’s out for vengeance. All that might be a bit too convenient, considering she was played by Karina Logue, the actor’s real life sister, but Toric is sure to be a major player moving forward.

A few more things:

-“This Kenny G shit’s gonna give my cancer cancer.”

-The club’s lawyer is played by Robin Weigert. I knew I recognized her from something but couldn’t figure out what (looking it up is cheating). Last night it hit me, Weigert played Calamity Jane in “Deadwood.”

-As I predicted last week, Jax isn’t going to just hand Tig over, and that’s going to make Pope mad. A confrontation is brewing.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/21/sons-of-anarchy-5-11-to-thine-own-self/feed/3Sons of Anarchy 5.10: Crucifixedhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/14/sons-of-anarchy-5-10-crucifixed/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/14/sons-of-anarchy-5-10-crucifixed/#commentsThu, 15 Nov 2012 01:23:31 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=21202SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

I opened the previous two posts with some analysis of episode titles. I think we can all agree that won’t be necessary this time around. Instead, let’s begin at the beginning, with Juice’s future now that he’s been outed as a rat.

Few would argue that “Sons” isn’t entertaining, but whether it’s predictable and even a bit repetitive is another matter. That said, it’s always nice to get one right, and last week I called that rather than execute Juice, Jax would put him to work spying on Clay the same way he did Gemma. Just like Gemma, Juice is doing it to get back in the good graces of his family, which in his case is the club. Although the added bonus of, you know, not dying, probably didn’t hurt. He was never going to run after Roosevelt let him know what was what, because SAMCRO is all he has. It’s the same reason he snitched to begin with—in his mind, it was the only way he’d keep his patch.

Another part of my prediction, however, was that Jax showing mercy would be a sign that the wounds of Opie’s murder were finally starting to heal, allowing him to return to the levelheaded protagonist, we know and love. On that account it appears, so far anyway, that I was sadly mistaken. In his ongoing efforts to dispose of Clay, and thus mold the club to fit his (and his father’s) vision, Jax has morphed into the very thing he despises. He is continually lying, conniving, and plotting in an effort to achieve his goals. Case in point—he and Bobby bring Chibs into the fold regarding Juice, but the plan the three decide on and the one Jax presents to Juice are two very different things.

Juice is only the latest solider to be caught in the crossfire of the war between Jax and Clay, and given the survival rate of his predecessors, the forecast isn’t exactly promising. Much like Clay, Jax increasingly sees those around him as little more than tools he can use to accomplish his goals and then dispose of. He seems to be driven by little more than anger and blood lust.

Nowhere was this more clear than in his dealings with the Grim Bastards. He gives their president his word that he’ll allow Randall Hightower, the man who murdered Opie, to live. Then he turns around and has Chibs put a bullet through his skull. It was no accident that in the scene that immediately preceded it, Jax gave Pope his word that he’d hand Tig over once Clay is out of the picture.

This isn’t the first time the show has used the “you have my word” gag. In the season four episode “Dorylus,” Clay gives his word that when he steps down, he’ll support Bobby taking the gavel in return for voting his way on getting into the drug running business. Later on, Bobby watches Clay use the same phrase to convince the Wahewa chief he’s not making any additional money on their ammunition, which Bobby knows full well is a lie.

All this seems to indicate two things. First, that like his stepfather before him, Jax’s word no longer means shit. And second, that Jax isn’t going to give Tig up quite so easily. Which means all this playing nice with Pope, up to and including offering him the Charming Heights investment, is part of some long con, and there’s further conflict between the two in the horizon.

As Bobby points out following the Grim Bastards situation, Jax’s actions “hurt all of us.” Bobby’s mostly referring to the fact that in murdering Hightower, Jax “shit on two decades of brotherhood,” but the assessment had echoes in the (inevitable) conclusion of the Tara and Otto storyline. It’s become perfectly clear that there’s little the Jax of today isn’t willing to sacrifice, whether its SAMCRO’s relationship with another MC or his own mother’s health and safety. But through all of this, his family, Tara and his sons, have been the one thing he’s been unwilling to compromise. Ironically however, because she was trying to help the club, his wife’s about to be in some very hot water.

Tara accomplished what she set out to with her gratis work at the prison. Now that Otto’s once, twice, three times a murderer, the feds will have to throw out his testimony for the RICO case. On the other hand, the authorities aren’t going to have any trouble figuring out how he got that crucifix. The best case scenario then is while Tara somehow manages to avoid any legal charges, these events take a toll on her already fragile sanity (intentionally waking up your baby so you can feel needed is both creepy and masochistic). While at worst, she’ll face charges (and jail time) for being an accessory to murder. I can’t possibly imagine the show taking the Dr. Knowles in prison route, so just as Jax tells her, they’ll “get through this, like we always do.” But, as Tara responds, “that’s what scares her the most.” Given what we’ve already seen from Jax 2.0, those fears are entirely justified.

A few more things:

-I didn’t get into Clay’s side of things as much as I would’ve liked. Going to Galindo was a logical move him, but as he said to Juice, it might have been his most recent effort to “chase things [he] doesn’t even want anymore.” The only question remaining, then, is whether or not the remark, as well as his interactions with Gemma, were genuine. Does Clay know he’s being played, or is he really just a tired old man?

-When Tara woke up Thomas, it was painfully obvious the baby’s cries were added in post-production. It’s the little things that take you out of a scene.

-Upon finding out why Juice turned Rat, Jax says “maybe it’s time we changed a few bylaws,” to which Chibs responds “amen.” Amen to that amen.

-Speaking of Chibs, he continues to be the most downright awesome character in the show, but more importantly one of the last I can root for without it bringing up any moral conundrums. The man is a soldier, loyal to his very core, but still able to think for himself. You know what, fuck it, Chibs for president.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/14/sons-of-anarchy-5-10-crucifixed/feed/0Sons of Anarchy 5.09: Andare Pescarehttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/07/sons-of-anarchy-5-09-andare-pescare/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/07/sons-of-anarchy-5-09-andare-pescare/#commentsThu, 08 Nov 2012 01:37:47 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=21050SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

I began last week’s post with a bit of analysis on the episode’s title. Given the newest episode’s intriguing name, “Andare Pescare,” I’d be foolish not to follow that formula again here. The title is a (grammatically incorrect, apparently) take on an Italian phrase meaning “gone fishing.” Just like last week, that could refer to a number of things. None of them involve actual fish.

One possible interpretation is as a reference to Frankie Diamonds hiding out in a Tahoe fishing cabin. Another, given the involvement of the Italian mob in the plot, is that it alludes to the famous “Godfather” quote, “Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes.” After that, we have to get metaphorical up in this bitch. Jax continues to fish for tangible evidence that Clay was behind the break-ins, as well as information about the “rat at the table” Roosevelt spoke of.

The list goes on, but let’s get into the Frankie plot. The meat and potatoes of the episode came from the club’s search for the last of the trio of ex-Nomad traitors. After leaving Chibs with a nasty bump on the head, Frankie met up with some mobsters he paid for protection. The club finds the mob boss at a restaurant and, after a bit of a scuffle, they’re able to get the information they need thanks to some trademark Jax ingenuity. Apparently, Frankie’s deal stipulated he give his guardians all the money he stole from the club. But Jax tells the Don Frankie stole half a mil rather than the $150 thousand he actually took. It’s a smart play, better to appeal to Mafia greed than rely on honor among thieves.

Meanwhile, Clay’s still on a mission to silence anyone who can prove he was involved with the Nomads, and Juice is still his butt boy. Clay gets a tip on the fugitive Nomad’s whereabouts from some (other) mobsters and uses it in the hopes he can find and kill Frankie before Jax and company show up. He doesn’t get that opportunity, as the guys show up just in time to stop him. Fortunately for Clay, the mob boss kills Frankie before Jax gets a chance to talk to him. However, perhaps fortunately for Jax (and by extension, the rest of us), Frankie tells Juice, “Clay put this whole Nomad shit storm in motion… We stole a safe, gave him back all that legal shit.”

Which brings us to Juice, whose initial reaction is to call Frankie a liar. But given the way the episode ended, with Jax following Juice home after figuring out he’s the rat, being privy to Frankie’s last words might be what saves Juice’s life. We still don’t know exactly why Clay is trying so hard to protect the documents in the safe, but the fact that he’s trying tells us all we need to know: they contain the information Jax needs to put Clay out commission with the club’s consent. As was the case with Frankie, Jax will need a unanimous vote in order for Clay to “meet Mr. Mayhem,” and whatever’s in that safe is how he’s going to get it.

The remaining question then is whether Juice is smart enough to realize that a man in Frankie’s situation, with a gun to his head, about to be executed for betraying his brothers, has no reason to lie. It didn’t look like it at the end of the episode, as Juice was still playing Clay’s bitch. Here’s my prediction: things will click for Juice when he’s the one looking down a barrel. He’ll tell Jax the truth, all of it. This episode seemed to be a turning point for our young president, for a while there, Opie’s death turned him into a bloodthirsty revenge addict, but the wisdom and leadership he displayed this week indicates a return to form. As such, Jax will let Juice live, but use him the same way he’s using Gemma. At least that’s what I’m hoping for anyway. If this season ends with Opie and Juice in the ground, but not Clay, well, that’d suck.

Speaking of Gemma, she took a whole episode to make essentially the same decision she made last week. More often than not in “Sons of Anarchy,” all that time she spent “thinking” and hanging out with Nero to reach that same conclusion would’ve seemed liked filler (when it comes to Gemma’s storylines in particular). But this time, this one time, it worked. This episode made Gemma (and us) realize just how well she and Nero work together. Although I think he was right when he said the whole “lovebirds” thing was “too on the nose,” if not for Gemma, than for the audience. Anyway, what it all goes to show is despite how happy Nero makes Gemma, her family, her son and grandchildren, are things she simply cannot live without. By putting some distance between the final decision and the car accident, it makes both Jax and the audience understand just what she’s risking, but more importantly giving up, to spy on Clay, and without all the anger that was clouding our judgment after she put Abel and Thomas in danger. Hopefully, Gemma will have Juice on her side next week, both in terms of getting dirt on Clay and in case her old man decides to bounce her around like a basketball again.

The only remaining plot thread then is Tara and Otto’s. Not much to say on that account, the show did a good job of putting it all out there. Although while I understand why the perfume made Otto cry and masturbate, I’m not so sure what it meant for Tara.

Anyway, things keep getting better and better in the fifth season of “Sons of Anarchy,” and 90-minute episodes start next week.

A few more things:

-Regardless of who you voted for yesterday, Jax Teller is the one president we can all support. Sorry, I just couldn’t allow a punpportunity like that to pass me by.

-Quinn, the Nomad who tips the club off to Frankie’s whereabouts, was played by Rusty Coones, the founder of the Orange County chapter of the Hells Angels.

-A theory on Tara diddling herself: Along with not telling Jax about the offer from the hospital in Oregon, it’s further representation of her transformation from doctor to old lady, with less middle ground as time passes. Going along with that, as she gets deeper into the nitty gritty, legal gray areas of being queen of bikerville, she hopes that her relationship with Jax will have the same raw emotion, that almost physical dependency, that Otto and Luann’s still has despite her death and his incarceration. Or maybe I’m way off, that scene was seriously confusing.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/07/sons-of-anarchy-5-09-andare-pescare/feed/0Sons of Anarchy 5.08: Ablationhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/01/sons-of-anarchy-5-08-ablation/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/01/sons-of-anarchy-5-08-ablation/#commentsThu, 01 Nov 2012 04:24:00 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=20844SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

This post will have to begin like a drunk best man’s half-assed toast: The dictionary defines ablation as “the removal, especially of organs, abnormal growths, or harmful substances, from the body by mechanical means, as by surgery.” It makes sense, there was a whole lot of ablation (metaphorical and otherwise) going on in this week’s episode.

For Gemma, ablation meant hopping on the wagon—quitting booze and pot—following the accident. So she’s literally removing harmful substances from her body, or ceasing to put them in at least. But for Jax and Tara, Gemma is the harmful substance. Putting Abel and Thomas’s lives in danger by driving high was the last straw, and they banish her from the family. Earlier on, Nero told Jax, “You need to accelerate the endgame. Get away from all the shit that’s trying to kill you.” Cutting Gemma off was a step in that direction, or at least it was until Jax needed to use her to ablate Clay, the greater of two evils.

The problem then is that Jax, though fully aware that he’ll never get out of “the life” alive, has done nothing to accelerate the endgame. And with the events of this week’s episode, it’s not too large of a stretch to say he’s shifted into reverse and stepped on the gas. Every time Jax think’s he’s out he pushes himself back in.

You could argue Jax is forced to react to events around him the way a badass biker should and must, that it’s not his fault, that his actions are rational, justified, even moral (at least relative to the show, it’s a real low bar). You could, but you’d be wrong. There have been some subtle changes in Jax’s attitude since Opie died. It’s in his menacing smirk as he beats a prison guard to death with a snow globe or takes an axe to the corpse of the man Frankie hired to kill him. It’s a bit less subtle as he shrugs off Tig killing the guard’s wife as “collateral damage,” or puts his arm around the shoulder of the second attacker in feigned forgiveness before putting a few rounds in his gut. When he did that, even Happy gave him a “who the hell are you, man?” look. Happy, who’s so violent it’s funny (because he’s such a great character and, let’s face it, we might not like a guy who gets a smiley face tattoo for every kill if it was presented as straightforward or serious).

But back to Jax. Then, there’s his newfound buddy-buddy relationship with Pope. Not that much time has passed since the man burned one of Tig’s daughters alive in front of him. Yet Pope is now Jax’s trusted business associate, they do favors for each other, make money together, all the things gangster pals do. Every time they meet you can see Jax’s subconscious gears turning. Even if he doesn’t recognize it yet, Pope is a man he admires and looks up. Jax views him as a role model—a vision of his potential future as a kingpin. None of this depicts the attitude of a man who truly wants to get out.

One last example: Jax’s decision to allow Gemma back into the fold if she helps him to bring down Clay, his archnemesis. Granted, this is the one thing that you could argue (and maybe even get me to agree) is justified. Not only that, it actually meshes with both the purported goal of “accelerating the endgame” and taking the fast lane to kingpinville. The world isn’t big enough for the both of them, and for Jax and Clay, the table is the world. At the end of the day, using Gemma is a theoretically reasonable and potentially effective plan. After all the suffering she’s left in her wake, up to and including falling asleep at the wheel with two toddlers in the backseat, not to mention her role in JT’s death, which Jax doesn’t even know about (yet), you might even say she’s simply reaping what she sowed.

Yet none of those tallies in the “pro” column changes the fact that Gemma is still Jax’s mother, and not only does he decide to whore her out, it’s to a john that Jax knows has beaten her to a pulp for crossing him (at least once) already. Nevertheless, Jax still had my complete support right up until he told Gemma her options were to go along with the plan or “get used to living in a brothel.” The line paralleled Hamlet telling Ophelia to “Get thee to a nunnery,” which made it even more awesome for about five seconds before I realized how incredibly sad it and the situation were for both parties. But after another five it was back to “fuck yeah” because Gemma has been annoying the crap out of us all.

The shit covered fan is officially spinning, and it was announced on Monday that the season’s final five episodes will be extended. Next week, “Andare Pescare” will run 75 minutes (counting commercials) and the four installments that follow will run 90. Finding out we’ll get so much more time to watch the metaphorical feces drip down the wall was the best news I got all week. Please don’t quote that out of context.

A few more things:

-Let’s all say a prayer of thanks to the writers for keeping Chibs alive, I’ll admit they had me spooked. Please, Sutter, if you’re reading this, take any of your characters but never the one true Scotsman.

-I think we all know Clay’s little “moment” with Juice was nothing but a masquerade. He’s not relating to a peer with similar experiences but putting those tidbits in his back pocket until they’re useful. He needs a new lackey, what with Tig a born-again Jaxian, two Nomads dead and the other on the run. My guess is that right when Jax is starting to close in, Clay will throw Juice under the bus and use the controversy as a distraction, metaphorical pocket sand.

-Tara’s response when Jax says they need to cut Clay out and kill him: “How do we do that?” We. If she wasn’t officially an outlaw old lady before, conspiracy to commit murder (a Class A felony in the state of California) will do it.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/11/01/sons-of-anarchy-5-08-ablation/feed/0Sons of Anarchy 5.07: Toad’s Wild Ridehttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/24/sons-of-anarchy-5-07-toads-wild-ride/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/24/sons-of-anarchy-5-07-toads-wild-ride/#commentsThu, 25 Oct 2012 02:10:48 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=20603SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

After the final scene of last week’s episode revealed what everyone already knew, that the Nomads were behind the home invasions and Clay was the one pulling their strings, the opening of “Toad’s Wild Ride” filled in some new information: the specifics of Clay’s deal with his new lackeys. When Clay tells them to get out of town for a while, Frankie Diamonds (who’s played by Chuck Zito, the former president of the New York chapter of the Hells Angels) responds, “What about our deal? We get you back at the head of the table and we get a piece of your end.”

As Unser put it, “Who has something to gain by making the club weak; turning the town and the sheriffs against them? Suddenly the pretty guy they gave the gavel too, he ain’t looking all that smart.” But we’ve always known it was Clay, and we’ve always known Clay’s only goal since losing the presidency was getting it back. So I suppose that stuff’s not really new either. Here’s what is: Clay’s finally dropped the whole “lion in winter” act.

Clay’s been slowly regaining strength (both literal and figurative) for some time, but he’s continued playing the weak old man. Last week, his doctor told him things were looking up health-wise and he no longer needed the oxygen tank. Nonetheless, Clay put it back on as soon as he left the office and lied to Juice about his uplifting prognosis. Now, he’s ceased putting on airs (pun intended), or at least modified his bullshit. He no longer argues with the people who hate him, he simply agrees that they have every right to. He tells Tara she’s “supposed to hate [him], like [she] does,” and Jax that “I know you think I’m the devil, son, and you’ve got every right to assume that I’d be the one setting fire to your table.” Although he follows up the latter by proclaiming his innocence, hence modified bullshit.

But let’s pump the breaks on Clay for a moment, with six episodes left there will be plenty of time to talk about his misdeeds. Instead, let’s talk about Juice. Last season, Juice was suicidal. Roosevelt blackmailed (hey, another pun) him into snitching and he was forced to kill his “innocent” brother Miles as a result (I put innocent in quotes because let’s face it, these guys are a bunch of gun and drug-running thugs, affable though they may be). Chibs noticed something was up with “Juicey boy” and tipped off Clay, who granted him the “Men of Mayhem” patch partly because of the adept way he’d handled the Russians and Mayans, but also as a way to lift his spirits.

Juice was a broken man. That patch, and the honor and respect it represented, as well as Clay’s words when he gave it to him (“I love you, son”) were exactly what Juice needed at that moment. Clay became the badass, white biker father he’d never had, and ever since, he’s been loyal to Clay to a fault. Now, Clay’s pulled his most devoted apostle into the whirlpool of his deceit, and that loyalty could land Juice on the wrong end of a gun.

Ever since we found out the tragic circumstances of JT’s death, there’s been no question Clay will lie, cheat, steal, and even kill to save his own skin. We saw that this week, when he set up the plan to eliminate two of the Nomads (including GoGo, whose DNA will implicate him in the home invasions). In one fell swoop, he attempted to distance himself from his minions and regain some of Unser’s trust (although I don’t think old Wayne will believe it for a second). Based on the preview for next week’s episode, Juice is in for a double whammy. He’ll come clean to Clay about the blackmail and killing Miles, and Roosevelt is going to reveal to Jax that he ratted in return for Clay, who’s responsible for the death of the sheriff’s wife. It’s obviously well within Clay’s playbook to set up this mess as a distraction from his own misdeeds. The preview ends with a Son on his knees with a gun to his head. Here’s hoping it’s Frankie and not Juice, (WARNING UPCOMING SEMI-SPOILER FOR “THE SHIELD,” ANOTHER FX SHOW KURT SUTTER WORKED ON) who’s always been to SAMCRO as Lem was to the Strike Team (END SPOILERS).

One last thing on the Jax/Clay situation: At least one of the guys involved in the drive-by was black, which complicates things a bit. It could mean Pope is somehow involved in the Clay/Nomad deal. Alternatively, it was mentioned that Warren, the con man played by Joel McHale, runs with a crew. So it could’ve been his guys getting revenge. After all, it seems silly to get a name like McHale to play a one (and one-tenth) and done character. If he’s just going to disappear now, his familiar face did nothing but detract from the suspension of my disbelief, which is a point in favor of this option. But the far more likely scenario is still that Clay hired a random black gang banger so he could make Pope a scapegoat. After all, Clay’s really only ever had one move when he needed to bail himself out of trouble: blame it on the blacks. Think about it, Donna got shot, blame it on the blacks, Opie shot me, blame it on the blacks, and so on and so forth.

Now, on to the episode’s last bit of drama: Gemma falling asleep at the wheel and crashing with the Teller children in tow. Filthy Phil had a concerned look on his face as Gemma buckled the kids in. After all, she’d been smoking pot and maybe drinking just a little bit earlier and had likely been awake for more than 24 hours dealing with her car getting stolen, Unser being attacked, and the rest. The sequence ended with what appeared to be Abel’s blood dripping onto his stuffed toad, hence the title “Toad’s Wild Ride.”

The scene was foreshadowed in Jax and Gemma’s earlier conversation, in which mama bear revealed that her overbearing, possessive love of Jax stems from the early death of his older brother Thomas. Said discussion led to Jax advocating for Gemma to watch the kids for the weekend, despite Tara’s misgivings, which in turn led to the fateful crash. Is the death of Tara’s oldest child (I know, Abel’s not technically her child, but still) the final step of her transformation into Gemma? Well…

Here’s the thing, I’m still not positive Abel’s dead. Jax and Gemma’s discussion could have been a red herring. Maybe it was Gemma’s blood, or some grape juice. Maybe Abel’s alive but seriously injured. Sutter’s been known to pull that kind of thing before. Remember when we were all convinced Juice had hung himself? Because I sure do. Maybe it won’t be Tara turning into Gemma because of the death of her eldest child, but Jax turning into Nero because his son is now handicapped.

The result could be any of these things, or none of them. Here’s what we know for goddamn sure: Tara is going to tear Gemma to shred regardless. Remember when she beat the shit of Carla for almost getting Jax killed? That was one thing, she knows the kind of life her husband lives. But her children? And after she continually reiterated that she was trusting Gemma in spite of her best instincts? Gemma is in for a (overly due) beatdown. Tara’s rage could also land on Jax. After all, it was his idea to trust Gemma with the kids in the first place.

No matter what, this episode moved a whole lot of interesting plot lines forward and set the tables for a few more. I have to admit I was worried about the show falling off after a few of the season’s weaker episodes, but after this week I’m sure we’re in for the same thing Toad was. Get it? A wild ride.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/24/sons-of-anarchy-5-07-toads-wild-ride/feed/1Sons of Anarchy 5.06: Small Worldhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/17/sons-of-anarchy-5-06-small-world/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/17/sons-of-anarchy-5-06-small-world/#commentsThu, 18 Oct 2012 01:23:16 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=20248SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

“Who’s doing this to us?” Gemma asks at the beginning of “Small World,” referring to the home invasions that have been plaguing Charming. The same question has been on everyone’s mind, Gemma was just the one who happend to voice it. At the end of the episode, we finally got the answer to her question: Clay. He’s been pulling the Nomads’ strings and orchestrating the break-ins, although he didn’t intend for anyone, let alone Roosevelt’s wife, to die. He yells as much at his puppets during the reveal.

Now, most everyone has suspected Clay since the close-up on Greg the Peg’s prosthetic leg in the season premiere, which is why I refer to the ending as a reveal rather than a twist. This was always an Occam’s Razor scenario. Who else had more to gain from “stirring the pot,” as Unser put it? Who else had anything to gain? Plus, the Nomads have been parroting Clay’s every word at the table and working to undermine Jax’s leadership since the day they arrived in Charming.

Likewise, Clay’s had his mind set on returning to the head of the table ever since the gavel was taken from him. Despite losing his once-substantial physical power, he was never going to just lay down. Clay’s been using his wits to return to a position of power. And now, he’s even got some of that brawn coming back to him. In “Stolen Huffy,” we saw him lifting weights. This week, he continued to wear his oxygen tank, even after his doctor says he no longer needs it, so he can continue to garner sympathy and maintain his wounded warrior image.

“Small World” confirmed Clay’s misdeeds to the viewer, and based on the promo for next week’s episode, it seems Jax will figure things out as well. With six of the season’s thirteen episodes in the books, the action’s starting to ramp up. Moving forward, that means Clay’s return to his prominent position as the show’s main antagonist, plus some conflict with Roosevelt as well as the newly introduced con man played by Joel McHale. Not to mention that the club’s amicable relationship with Damon Pope simply cannot last.

This week however, SAMCRO ended a more short-term beef—that with the prison guard who helped orchestrate Opie’s murder. While Jax and the rest of the “good guys” have always walked the line between anti-hero and straight villain, all their actions in that scene outside of killing the man himself fell squarely in the latter category. They were affable villains no doubt, but they were still villains. I know I smiled when I heard Jax say “get a pipe,” but Tig took it a bit too far with the whole murdering the man’s innocent wife thing. Yet instead of saying as much, Jax simply smiles and declares the woman “collateral damage.” However, it makes total sense for the guys to be holding a grudge. After all, Ope was Jax’s best friend, and Tig feels guilty that his actions played such a large part in causing Opie’s death.

As such, we’re finally seeing the intense behavioral and emotional reactions I expected after that cataclysmic event. But given all the callousness and cold-blooded murder in “Small World,” the happy-go-lucky tone of last week’s episode now seems problematic continuity-wise. In my review of “Orca Shrugged,” I noted that the guys seemed to have gotten over the loss of their brother (and Tig having his daughter barbecued in front of him) remarkably fast. It almost seems like their grieving process is going in reverse. Maybe they should have gotten the anger and vengeance out of their systems before being struck by the attractiveness of a transexual prostitute. Then again, it was nice to have a laugh after all the torment we’ve been put through this season, and Walton Goggins appearance may have been the single best cameo of all-time, so I suppose I’ll call it a wash.

There were a few other developments this week, all of them significantly less interesting Tara fails to sway Otto back to the club’s side and then lies about it to Jax, saying she never got the chance to see him. Someone, namely Unser, finally calls Gemma out on her shit. Jax and Pope negotiate a deal for the club to mule even more cartel cocaine. But the event that takes the crown for most boring subplot of the week had to be Carla’s suicide. For a while we’ve seen her sulking whenever Gemma and Nero are together, hinting that she might have been Nero’s bottom bitch at one point. Now out of the blue she forced the two into bed together and killed herself. It wasn’t exactly scintillating television.

The scene was poorly handled, seeming to miss a few big points out of Storytelling 101. First of all, why reveal her backstory in the moments just before and after her death? If the audience hasn’t come to know, understand, and relate to the character before tragically ending her life, the event has no impact outside of shock value. The show killed off the character and then explained why we should care, instead of the other way around. It was truly a strange choice as “Sons of Anarchy” tends to do well with both serial and one-off story arcs. The only possible motivation I can see for the move is wringing a tad bit of shock value out of a character the writers knew was going nowhere, perhaps as an excuse to get Nero and Gemma back together (which everyone and their mother knows is coming).

Nonetheless, “Small World” had several strong sequences and was enjoyable in spite of its weak ones. And now that we know Jax and Clay are going to clash in the near future, I remain both hopeful and excited for the future of “Sons of Anarchy.”

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/17/sons-of-anarchy-5-06-small-world/feed/0Sons of Anarchy 5.05: Orca Shruggedhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/10/sons-of-anarchy-5-05-orca-shrugged/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/10/sons-of-anarchy-5-05-orca-shrugged/#commentsWed, 10 Oct 2012 22:15:44 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=20039SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

After all the depressing shit that’s happened so far in the fifth season of “Sons of Anarchy,” this week’s episode, “Orca Shrugged,” was a welcomed comedic interlude. Ironically, it also included a pregnant woman being shot in the belly. But let’s start with the fun stuff.

The centerpiece of the episode was a surprise guest appearance from Walton Goggins as transexual call girl Venus Van Damme. Those of you who watched “The Shield” will recognize the actor as well as his character’s name, a reference to Cletus Van Damme, an alias used by Detective Shane Vendrell in that program. If you’re interested, Goggins did this interview with Entertainment Weekly regarding his part in “Sons.” There’s a lot of insight into how the appearance came to be and how this manly man of an actor prepared for his, ahem, unusual role. In it, Goggins says Kurt Sutter mentioned neither he nor Michael Chiklis could appear on “Sons” because of “how closely relatable they are to their characters on ‘The Shield.'” Luckily, Goggins called bullshit on that one, and we can only hope Chiklis will someday do the same. A plethora of actors from “The Shield” have gotten roles in “Sons,” but Chiklis is now the only member of the Strike Team who hasn’t made an appearance. Recall David Rees Snell (the unbearably cool Ronnie Gardocki) took the role of Federal Agent Grad Nicholas and Kenny Johnson (Curtis “Lem” Lemansky) played club member Kozik.

But let’s talk about why Goggins was there. Mayor Hale needed one more vote to get his Charming Heights project approved. Despite the club being against that kind of McReal Estate last year, now they’re picking their battles, and they’re alright with the development if it means they can use one of Hale’s properties to set up their new escort business with Nero. So they decide to blackmail a city council member to get the mayor his vote.

Goggins scene was nothing short of hilarious, with lines like “didn’t your daddy ever tell you not to judge a book by its penis?” When they needed to convince the councilman’s step son to take some bait, the rest of the club got in on the humor too. Jax insists “it doesn’t mean you’re gay man, we’ve all been there.” “Really? All you guys?” the kid responds. Juice then says, “Lot of cock,” Chibs interjects with “two dicks,” and back to Juice with “slammin’ cock.” Insert One Chibs Two Dicks joke here.

All in all, this was probably the funniest episode of “Sons of Anarchy” to date. From the aforementioned scene to Jax’s fistfight, or “Irish discussion,” with Galen, which Clay insisted would end in nothing but “Guinness and man hugs.” And of course, Tig’s joke that something that’s “pink, wet, and smells like sunshine” could refer either to pussy or Italian ice, and that he was OK with both.

Like I said, we needed some laughs after all the tough events this season. But here’s the rub: would it have been so hard to combine the humor with a tad more plot development? It was nice to get some comic relief, but that’s really all this episode was, distraction from the story lines we really want to move forward. The fistfight and Galen shooting up the bikes was fun, sure, but in terms of plot it served no purpose. We already know the Irish will back out of the cartel deal if Clay’s not involved, we really don’t need a reminder.

One more thing, it was nice to see Tig back to his old self, but I can’t help but wonder about the logistics of the timeline here. It can’t have been that long since his daughter got, oh, I don’t know, BURNED ALIVE IN FRONT OF HIM. Not to mention Opie’s death, which Tig himself has admitted was his fault to some degree. Sure, laughter can the be the best medicine for those in mourning. But that’s generally because the moments in between the laughs are filled with, well, mourning. Perhaps the idea that Tig’s still struggling with that stuff could have been played up a bit more. It would only have taken a few lines: Tig’s depressed and the guys have to convince him to take a part in the blackmail scheme, which ends up being therapeutic (in a fucked-up Tig sort of way).

There was only one event that offered any significant plot development in this episode, and it involved Lt. Roosevelt’s wife getting shot, which no doubt led to the death of their unborn child. The Sheriff was already up the club’s ass over the recent home invasions. Now, it’s personal. I mean, not only did his wife take a bullet, but in early episodes we learned she was having a difficult time getting pregnant. Everything else aside, who’s to say that bullet won’t rob the couple of their one chance to ever become parents? Expect to see a good deal of Rockmond Dunbar in the next few episodes.

This ordeal is also going to lead to some movement in Clay’s subtle return to prominence. At this point, I don’t think there’s any question the Nomads are behind the home invasions and Clay is the one calling the shots. We got another argument at the table between Chibs and Tig, Jax’s boys, and the Nomads. Plus, Roosevelt’s wife was able to get a good scratch on one of the burglars, and the Lieutenant later demanded that the nurses give him a sample of the skin underneath her fingernails. Yes, it’s standard police procedure, but it’s also no coincidence that line was spoken on screen. Shit, meet fan.

Aside from that, we didn’t get a whole lot. Things are moving forward with the escort business. Tara got some good news from the doctor, but was so nervous she couldn’t stop her hand from shaking while sewing up Tig’s ass wound. Oh, and Nero and Gemma’s break-up isn’t going to be free of drama, but we always knew that. Let’s be honest, Jax insisting the two stop seeing each other wasn’t going to end any other way. It was kind of a cheap way of milking some more conflict out of Gemma, and frankly, the character has been nothing short of boring for a few seasons now. I can’t imagine a less interesting relationship fallout.

I, for one, am still waiting for Jax to put a bullet in that prison guard’s head. Not to mention the club moving away from the cartel and the Irish so he can put one in Clay’s cranium while he’s at it. And, of course, the war with Pope, which the Sons will inevitably win despite the deaths of another member or two. Luckily, the promo for next week’s episode suggests plenty of action. It was nice to get some laughs in this week, but hopefully there will be some forward movement in all those plot areas and more in weeks to come.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.

]]>http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/10/sons-of-anarchy-5-05-orca-shrugged/feed/0Sons of Anarchy 5.04: Stolen Huffyhttp://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/04/sons-of-anarchy-5-04-stolen-huffy/
http://blog.bullz-eye.com/2012/10/04/sons-of-anarchy-5-04-stolen-huffy/#commentsThu, 04 Oct 2012 08:29:08 +0000http://blog.bullz-eye.com/?p=19861SPOILER WARNING: This post will appear every Wednesday following a new episode of “Sons of Anarchy.” It is intended to be read after seeing the show’s latest installment as a source of recap and analysis. As such, all aspects and events that have occurred up to and including the episode discussed are fair game.

I predicted the title of last week’s episode,”Laying Pipe,” meant something beyond the obvious: that Opie’s death would be the spark that lit the fire behind the rest of this season. As such, this week’s installment would offer both a proper send-off for the beloved deceased and begin to drive the story forward, laying foundation for everything to come. After what happened, a drop in intensity was unavoidable. I just didn’t expect the drop to be quite so far.

While “Stolen Huffy” did deliver that emotional goodbye, too much of the action was focused on wrapping up old plot threads instead of kickstarting new ones. The most obvious representation of this was the continuation of the same old shit between Gemma, Tara, and Wendy. When Jax took the gavel with Tara standing behind him, it was supposed to change things for Gemma. She was, both literally and figuratively, on the outside looking in. Instead, she keeps manipulating everyone, or trying to anyway, and stirs up drama from the same tired power struggle pot. Oh, and Wendy still wants to see her kid. Surprise!

There was also a lot of time to devoted to the aftermath of Nero’s brothel being raided. The gang the “companionator” is in league with believes Emma Jean (Ashley Tisdale) called the cops and wants her dead for it. Jax and company are forced to “rescue” the character, who we barely know and hasn’t done anything especially intriguing in the short time she’s been around. Besides the fact that she’s famous for starring in something on the Disney channel, at this point there’s not a whole lot of reason to give a shit. And by that I mean there’s not a whole lot of reason to give a shit. In fairness, all that stuff lead to Jax and Nero’s new partnership. But it took a significant chunk of screentime to get there.

That said, the story elements that did continue to develop were subtly engaging. Namely, I mean Clay’s continued behind the scenes plotting, which the club remains oblivious to. The camera work during the early scene at the table was revealing. Jax speaks and Clay retorts. Chibs and Tig back their president, while the newly-patched former Nomads seem to echo Clay’s concerns. It certainly lead credence to the theory that Clay is the one orchestrating the break-ins and likely notified vice about Nero’s establishment. Recall last season’s finale, when Jax first took his seat at the head of the table. Just sitting there made him the leader, and when Tig made a move for his customary position, all Jax had to do was raise his hand and say “no,” and so it was. Now these new guys think they’ve earned the right to spout off? They didn’t get that kind of gumption on their own. With Opie out of the picture, a weight has been taken off Clay’s shoulders. The old man is on his way back, regaining strength, as symbolized by his lifting weights. As long as Pope remains in the picture, it’ll be hard to return to his status as the series’ main antagonist, but this is Clay, he’ll get there before too long.

At the end of the day however, all that stuff was just a series of distractions from the last item on the agenda: Opie’s wake. More specifically, the various ways the characters coped with his death. Most of the club remained stoic despite the loss of their brother. Only Lyla and Gemma really seemed to outwardly struggle with the news.

The key word there is outwardly. After all, do we really want our big tough biker gang breaking down in tears? The montage sequence that ended the episode did a lot to show that despite their gruff exteriors, losing Opie really did hurt SAMCRO. Each dealt with it in their own way. Tig put a bottle of Patron in the casket, something for Ope to enjoy with his old man now that they’re back together (tequila was Piney’s favorite drink). Chibs did the Catholic routine and even sniffled a bit. And Clay, well, fuck Clay.

Protagonist that he is, it was Jax’s response that was the easiest to connect to. In tears, Lylya asked how she’s going to raise three children on her own. Jax replied by directing her attention to the people in the clubhouse, telling her “That’s your family.” It was a line that really hit home, especially when he placed the childhood photograph in the casket. Like Jax, I hadn’t really come to terms with the fact that Ope was gone until that moment. The move and all its connotations (that Opie saw death as more desirable than continuing the life he’d lead since that picture was taken, that he and Jax were once innocent children, that Opie’s own innocent children are going to grow up fatherless, etc.) hit even harder than seeing pipe collide with skull.

“Sons of Anarchy” is a series of peaks and valleys. After the ferocity of last week’s episode, “Stolen Huffy” did its best to be poignant and cerebral. That just means we can expect plenty of action to come, as foreshadowed by the shift from sadness to anger in Jax’s face as he slammed the hearse door closed. One can only hope it starts with fulfilling his promise to kill the prison guard that orchestrated Opie’s murder.

Check out the preview for next week’s episode below and follow the writer on Twitter @NateKreichman.